When we entered the abandoned building our first week in Honduras we often were asking ourselves, “Where do we begin?”  Six weeks later we are still asking the same question, even after much progress.  The first two weeks we scrubbed all the mud and bat feces off the floor and started clearing the area where we planned to construct the shower.  As soon as we began to make some progress, the rain came unrelentess for four straight days.  Finally, the rain stopped and we returned to the building to find all of our work ruined.  The house flooded with water, there was a mini landslide behind the building, which piled up on the area we had previous cleared for the shower.  But we didn’t let the bad luck hold us back.  The next day we started working on our composting toilet, which has been an object of oddity to those helping us, and at moments, to us as well.  But we hope that once it is complete it can be used as a model in the community as a sustainable latrine option for human waste management and a way to improve water quality in the River Valley.  

Obtaining electricity has been another challenge in this rather remote location.  But after many obstacles, we are excited to report that today a transformer is being installed that will be able to power the Un Mundo building and the surrounding homes of our neighbors. 

We have been making a lot of progress so far, but we’ve had a lot of set backs as well, although, this gives us all the more reason to celebrate our small successes, such as the steps to the back door, a wash basin, and the kitchen sink, which were recently completed and even more noteworthy, have running water. 

We hope to be able to be in the building full-time by the first week in April.  In the meantime, we are enjoying camping out a few times a week and getting closely acquainted with the current residents, the bats and scorpions.